What is the Tomatometer™?

The Tomatometer rating – based on the published opinions of hundreds of film and television critics – is a trusted measurement of movie and TV programming quality for millions of moviegoers. It represents the percentage of professional critic reviews that are positive for a given film or television show.

From the Critics

From RT Users Like You!

Fresh

The Tomatometer is 60% or higher.

Rotten

The Tomatometer is 59% or lower.

Certified Fresh

Movies and TV shows are Certified Fresh with a steady Tomatometer of 75% or higher after a set amount of reviews (80 for wide-release movies, 40 for limited-release movies, 20 for TV shows), including 5 reviews from Top Critics.

Quality film that bridges the gap between serious dramatic fare and the fast-talking screwball comedy; what a unique hybrid! Lucille Ball steals the show any time she's on screen and this may be the most likeable Katharine Hepburn has ever been.

Two stars for Hepburn alone. Most of the time was taken up by the girls bickering to put each other, and the world in general, down. I did not find this amusing and i took my attention away from the story too much.

Very cozy comedy drama about young women in a NYC boarding house hoping to make it on Broadway. Ginger Rogers is queen of the wisecracks and Katharine Hepburn is the rich girl slumming it to have a more authentic experience. The 1930s seem so different from today -- I can't even imagine that a place like the Footlights Club (boarding house) still exists. However, David Lynch does use Ann Miller (only 14 years old here) perfectly in Mulholland Dr, renting out cottages to Hollywood hopefuls, and thereby echoing the seamier side of Stage Door (where Adolphe Menjou's producer/exploiter is almost played for laughs).

the best part of "stage door" is that anytime someone is talking to katharine hepburn or ginger rogers' characters, they respond in the most dry and sarcastic way possible. it's a very quick witted film, and enjoyable mostly for that reason.

Timeless backstage story with good solid performances from Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers and Adolph Menjou. Supporting cast is outstanding, including Lucille Ball, Eve Arden, Andrea Leeds, Gail Patrick and a very young Ann Miller.

This film was a surprise, expecting the usual Hollywood smaltz, showbiz 1930's cliches, I put it on to snooze off to as background, but was woken up by its strange modernity, although made in 1937, set in a 'theatrical boarding house' for young ladies who come to NY to make it in theatre. It is packed full of fast talking 'wise cracks' nearly all of which are really sometimes LOL funny and again oddly modern. The girls struggle in a recession to eat, go on dates with unsuitable men in order to get dinner bought, nick each others clothes, do the audition rounds, and somehow hold on till they get a break. The material has a timeless quality whilst being innocent and dated but also seems relevant to the current recession. There is a chic flick element to it, in showing how they, despite competition and feuds, support one another and maintain friendships. It does lurch into into melodrama at one point but mostly retains a witty realism. Ginger Rogers is sparkling and funny really in her element before becoming known as Astaire's sidekick, there is a very young Lucille Ball, ditto Ann Miller. Andrea Leeds personifies the agony of an actress who can no longer get work and who has a role she has been chasing 'stolen' from her. I'm not a great Hepburn fan, but can see how she was a feminist prototype and excels at haughty. A film like this with this many strong and funny and glamorous female roles would not be made today. The universal spirit of the theatre is conveyed in a goose-bump raising speechette where Catherine Collier (ex-actress) talks the new actress (Katherine Hepburn) into carrying on to her opening night despite a tragic death of a friend by reminding her 'there are 50 living people dependent on you, the ushers, the property men, the old women who clean out the theatre, each one of them has a right to demand that you give the best performance that you can, that's the tradition of the theatre".

Stage Door follows the trials and tribulations of a group of aspiring actresses living together in a theatrical boarding house. The overwhelmingly female cast is more ensemble than star-led despite the joint top-billing of Ginger Rogers and Katharine Hepburn, and there are no weak links in this superb examination of life behind the curtain. Hepburn plays Terry Randall, a society girl who aspires to become an actress much to her father's dismay. Her class immediately provokes the scorn of the other girls, in particular her roommate Jean (Rogers), who believes her to be slumming it, supported by a sugar daddy where the rest of the girls struggle to earn enough money to eat. Amongst the other girls are early performances from the young Lucille Ball and Ann Miller (only 14 at the time), and little-known Andrea Leeds as Kay.

Kay is the true heart of this story. In amongst the witty banter and spiky raillery between Terry and Jean, there is real drama and pain in her story. Stage Door is great as a comedy-drama, it's funny and clever, but it's ultimately elevated and memorable because it includes a moment of real tragedy. The transition in the final act to almost pure drama is impressively handled and ultimately heart-wrenching.